As someone who loves being around others, I sometimes find myself detached from my inner self.

Few weeks ago, I was going through a rough time, figuring out why I was feeling unfulfilled. I would sometimes get sad and depressing thoughts coming in and out. Weird thing is, I’d ignore them. I would ignore the thoughts, because I couldn’t understand the root of it all.

Instead of figuring them out, I got myself more distracted by surrounding myself with others, emerging myself in other people’s lives, avoiding mine. It almost became my escape. As an extrovert, I feed off of people’s energies.

You can never know too many people.

Especially in college, where there is always something to do, it’s hard finding time for yourself. The time for myself was what I needed.

Alone, I was able to recharge myself. Being around others can mentally be draining sometimes, as there is a constant need for contact interaction. The combination of listening, making others happy and laugh, reading other people’s emotions, and responding appropriately leads to consuming a lot of energy. So instead of spending time thinking about people’s emotions, I was able to self-reflect. It’s important to be selfish and take the time to understand yourself. I started getting a deeper understanding of how I felt and it became easier to regulate my emotions.

Soon after I came up with things that I wished I had done in the past, but haven’t gotten around to. I created for myself opportunities in which I had strong interests in and found myself a job to become more independent.

College is a time for partying and schoolwork, but also a time of self-discovery. As I became more productive, the negative thoughts slowly disappeared. It’s easy to forget that there is more than just the campus bubble where everything is already pre-paid, losing a sense of reality. Between the mixture of studying late nights at the library and going out, you forget about the small things. You forget to find new things that interest you and can help you evolve as a person.

It’s important to understand what really makes you happy. When you're alone, you don’t need to compromise on others and you can just go for it. It also leads to more self-reliance. You become more in control of your decisions without seeking the advice from others.

It will also help you later in life in finding the balance between work, play, family and “me” time.

I made of a list of suggestions that people can try to get out of the college bubble and get some more self-reflective time.

• Instead of watching Netflix, read a book
• Get off campus and find new coffee shops
• Apply for a job/internship
• Write in a daily journal
• Join a club
• Make a list of all the things you want to achieve by the end of the year
• Keep your room clean
• Challenge yourself to not go on the Internet for a whole day
• Feel comfortable with yourself alone without getting bored
• Try a new restaurant every month
• Go out on excursions in the city or within the country or abroad
• Take a classic walk in the park
• Start an art project
• Meditate
• Inform yourself with what’s going on in the news
• Do something spontaneous
• Cook yourself dinner (anything instant doesn't count a.k.a ramen)
• Treat yourself to a spa day

Obviously everyone is different and can find themselves in different ways. Some people resort to working out, but I tend to see it as a strenuous obligation rather than a pleasant dopamine-releasing activity.

I’m happiest alone when I’m by the water or freely swimming. When I was younger, I'd spent most of my summers with extended family in the South of France. Mornings to sunsets, you could always find me in my grandparent’s outside pool in Èze. Between floating, swimming and catching frogs, it was my favorite place in the entire world. It still is. The picture above is the view from the pool and reminds me of home and family. It is my happy place. It reminds me that there is so much out there, so much one can achieve and experience in their lifetime.

It just takes some time to figure out and realize what you really want in life. I was unhappy, because I wasn't doing anything solemnly for myself and for my own interest. I wouldn't have figure it out if I didn't spend time by myself.

I'd recommend it to anyone and maybe you'll even surprise yourself.